I had a wonderful time in Memphis, Tennessee, during my Presidents’ Day weekend stay. The people were charming, the barbecue was outstanding, and the Memphis Pyramid was a joy to behold.

There were a few things the streets of Memphis were lacking: Used needles and human excrement. For those treasures, you have to head over to my home state of California and the city of San Francisco.

How dirty is San Francisco? An NBC Bay Area Investigation reveals a dangerous mix of drug needles, garbage, and feces throughout downtown San Francisco. The Investigative Unit surveyed 153 blocks of the city – the more than 20-mile stretch includes popular tourist spots like Union Square and major hotel chains. The area – bordered by Van Ness Avenue, Market Street, Post Street and Grant Avenue – is also home to City Hall, schools, playgrounds, and a police station.

As the Investigative Unit photographed nearly a dozen hypodermic needles scattered across one block, a group of preschool students happened to walk by on their way to an afternoon field trip to city hall.

“We see poop, we see pee, we see needles, and we see trash,” said teacher Adelita Orellana. “Sometimes they ask what is it, and that’s a conversation that’s a little difficult to have with a 2-year old, but we just let them know that those things are full of germs, that they are dangerous, and they should never be touched.”

The level of potentially infectious contamination rivals that of many third world countries.

The survey results led a University of California, Berkeley infectious disease expert to compare downtown San Francisco to slums in developing countries.

“The contamination is … much greater than communities in Brazil or Kenya or India,” Dr. Lee Riley told the station. Riley added that discarded needles could cause HIV and Hepatitis B and C, while dried feces can cause potentially dangerous viruses.

In part, the public health emergency is the result of the explosion in housing costs along the West Coast that has driven people to homelessness. Furthermore, Mohammed Nuru, Director of the San Francisco’s Public Works Department, estimates at least $30 million of the city’s street cleaning budget is used to clean up needles and feces from sidewalks and homeless encampments.

You would think a serious gubernatorial candidate would be poised to address this particular crisis. However, a Goggle search and scan of Facebook entries show that leading candidates in the state’s race for Governor this year have other priorities:

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Antonio Villaraigosa on Wednesday warned that the Trump administration’s vow to repeal the Affordable Care Act and renegotiate the North American Free Trade agreement could devastate millions of Californians and plunge the state into recession.

The former Los Angeles mayor also took shots at President Trump’s immigration policies, including his promise to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, suggesting he was trying to divide the country for his own political gain.

“We embrace our Latino heritage as every bit a part of our American heritage,” Villaraigosa said.

Given that California alone has at least $850 billion in new public works that must be built or repaired in the coming years — including 1,388 crumbling bridges and woefully deficient water infrastructure that deprives too many communities of safe drinking water — the President’s $200 billion national investment is no better than spit in the ocean. What he shamefully calls an infrastructure plan is really a cynical rouse for gutting environmental protections that keep our air, water, and communities safe.

In a nutshell: These three leading candidates are unhappy that Trump called other counties a shithole, are more concerned about Mexico than California’s public health issues, and are making it difficult to partner with the White House on potential solutions for our crumbing infrastructure that will prevent our state from becoming more of a shithole than it already is.

Little wonder, then, there is now a mass exodus of Bay area residents to other parts of the country, including Tennessee.

I am a supporter of the state of New California. I think that the rump of Old California, which would include San Francisco and similar benighted places, would be better named Shithole California. Someone with a talent for lyrics (such as you have here demonstrated) should draft new anthem for the rump set to the Eagles song “Hotel California.”

And…the picture was changed. I had to go back to look at the original one. For those who missed it, there was a needle, trash and an old CD, which had a picture that looked like a singer with a microphone. But, it was not a microphone….

Obviously many readers have not been on Castro Street in SF during festivals… the CD image is tame. However, it does represent accurately SF in all things. Anything and everything goes …. until the damage is so great that even the “open minded” wish they could complain.

Around my neck of the woods the most famous photo “oops” was back in 2004 when the Boston Globe ran photos from a hearing held by a brilliant Boston City Councilor and his sidekick activist friend, on American soldiers reportedly raping Iraqi women.

The photos featured graphic images from a hard core porn movie that the Councilors took to be real sexual assaults. The incident said a lot about the level of intelligence found on the Boston City Council and about the predisposition of those on the far left to believe just about anything negative about our troops. Of course, this was during the era of rampant BDS which seems mild compared to the current TDS infecting much of the country.

The migration out of San Francissy to other cities will be detrimental to the receiving locales. Those nuts will still vote for the marxists when they move despite the fact that the marxist made the mess that they want to leave behind.

I grieve for the good people of California, but seriously rather than move and bring your crazy ideas with you how about you stay in California and get to work cleaning up the mess you’ve allowed to be created?

No it isn’t too bad the movement to break Cali into more than one state hasn’t gained ground. California already gets more than 10% of the seats in the House of Representatives plus their two senators. All making them two states would do would be to give them an even bigger voice – and four senators.

When friends from out of town come to visit they always want to sight-see SF. We try to talk them into going to Monterey, Carmel and Big Sur – same distance, beautiful and SO much cleaner! Locals know how bad The City is and have no interest in going.

Why don’t we clean up our state? Conservatives are outnumbered. When I went to vote in the presidential election the poll workers had to stop and search for a Republican ballot because no one had voted R yet. This was the middle of the afternoon! Surrounded by liberals here. If California passes some legislation that is stupid, wacko and/or expensive I want y’all to know that I voted against it. Even when we occasionally pass something good the courts change it. Can’t win.

You have SEPARATE ballots for Dems and Republicans in a presidential election? That’s something right out of Communist Russia. And likely a violation of election law. All the names are supposed to be listed on a single ballot.

Hmmm – good point Granny. I can assure you that we are not Communist Russia! That would be further north, in Berkeley. All of the names and propositions are on the ballot as they should be. I always bring my sample ballot and it is the same as the official ballot. I don’t know why there is a distinction. Maybe to keep track? I don’t know. Maybe someone reading this who has worked Cali elections can better explain? All I know is the poll workers had to go to some polling supplies and get my paper ballot and put it in its sleeve while there were many already prepared ballots waiting for Democrats lying on the table.

As an airline pilot, San Francisco was my favorite city in the world in the 60′ and 70’s. Then the liberals took over the city government and allowed the streets and city parks to be overrun with filthy homeless bums who defecated and urinated in every bush, shrub and doorway in the city. My wife was a flight attendant and we would fly over the Christmas holidays to be in San Franciso it was so beautiful and exciting. Walking was the thing to do then. Or ride the street cars. The people were extremely friendly and it was a safe town. No more. 15 years later with two children, we went back after telling our kids what an enchanted place it was. It was like being in one of those “Day After” movies. Filth and trash, as well as the horrible smell, told us that we were too late. My God, how did they do it?

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